Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicle body rear structure including a vehicle accessory and a sub-frame below a floor panel.
Description of the Related Art
There is known a vehicle body rear structure in which a cross member is bridged over rear frames on both sides in a vehicle width direction, a sub-frame is provided to be connected to the cross member, and a rear suspension is supported by the sub-frame (for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-2233).
By connecting the sub-frame to the cross member, it is possible to ensure the support rigidity of the rear suspension. Furthermore, the cross member can support a load input from the rear suspension to the sub-frame.
To increase the support rigidity of the rear suspension, it is necessary to increase the sectional area of the cross member. Thus, the cross member narrows a space where a vehicle accessory such as a fuel tank is arranged.
To solve this problem, a space may be ensured by increasing the vehicle height. However, an increase in vehicle height may decrease the maneuverability of the vehicle.
On the other hand, there is known a vehicle body rear structure in which a lower cross member is joined to the lower surface of a rear floor panel, an upper cross member is jointed to the upper surface of the rear floor panel, and the rear flange of the lower cross member and the front flange of the upper cross member are joined while being overlaid (for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2010-76671).
By joining the rear flange of the lower cross member and the front flange of the upper cross member, it is possible to suppress the sectional area of the lower cross member to be small. This can increase a space below the rear floor panel without increasing the vehicle height, thereby arranging a vehicle accessory such as a fuel tank in the space.
However, in the vehicle body rear structure according to Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2010-76671, the lower cross member does not support a sub-frame. Thus, to ensure ride comfort, it is necessary to additionally include a cross member for supporting the sub-frame, resulting in an increase in vehicle weight.
Furthermore, since the sub-frame is not supported by the lower cross member, the support rigidity of the fuel tank is low, and it is thus difficult to suppress the generation of fuel flow noise (a so-called sloshing sound) caused by shaking of the fuel tank at the time of traveling.